Borat with Sacha Baron Cohen.
Oscar 2007: Eclectic Best Original Song Oscar longlist includes Borat, Bollywood
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced that 56 songs – ranging from “My Little Girl” and “Hillbilly Holla” to “Luka Chuppi” and “O Kazakhstan” – will be considered for inclusion in the 2007 Academy Awards’ Best Original Song category.
On Jan. 16, the Academy will screen clips featuring each song, in random order, for Music Branch voting members in both Beverly Hills and New York City.
According to the Academy’s press release, “to be eligible, a song must consist of words and music, both of which are original and written specifically for the film. A clearly audible, intelligible, substantive rendition of both lyric and melody must be used in the body of the film or as the first music cue in the end credit.”
Melissa Etheridge in the running
As to be expected, a number of songs from animated films (Happy Feet, Cars) have been included on the longlist. More surprisingly, so have a handful of ditties from non-English-language films (Deepa Mehta’s Water, Zhang Yimou’s Curse of the Golden Flower, Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra’s Rang De Basanti).
All that and “I Need to Wake Up,” too. Melissa Etheridge’s song is heard in Davis Guggenheim’s environmentally focused documentary An Inconvenient Truth.
Nominations for the 2007 Academy Awards will be announced on Tuesday, Jan. 23 at 5:30 a.m. PST in the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
The 2007 Academy Awards ceremony will be held on Sunday, Feb. 25, at the Kodak Theatre at the Hollywood & Highland Center.
Best Original Song Oscar longlist
Below is the list of songs eligible for the 2007 Oscars, in alphabetical order:
- “Believe It,” The Heart of the Game
- “The Best,” Everyone’s Hero
- “The Book I Write,” Stranger Than Fiction
- “Broken Bridges,” Broken Bridges
- “Chan Chan,” Water
- “Circle in the Sand,” Friends with Money
- “Coming Back to You,” Deja Vu
- “Definition of Love,” Akeelah and the Bee
- “Dreamz with a Z,” American Dreamz
- “Encarnacion,” Nacho Libre
- “Every Word,” Wordplay
- “Family of Me,” Over the Hedge
- “A Father’s Way,” The Pursuit of Happyness
- “The Girl in Byakkoya – White Tiger Field,” Paprika
- “Heist,” Over the Hedge
- “Hillbilly Holla,” Barnyard
- “Hollywood Familia,” Hollywood Familia
- “I Belong,” Open Season
- “I Need to Wake Up,” An Inconvenient Truth
- “In Rosa Vernat Lilium,” The Nativity Story
- “It’s a Fight,” Rocky Balboa
- “Ju Hua Tai,” Curse of the Golden Flower
- “Keep Holding On,” Eragon
- “Khalbali,” Rang de Basanti.
- “Kingdom of Love,” One Night with the King.
- “Listen,” Dreamgirls.
- “A Lonely Man,” Don’t Come Knocking.
- “Love You I Do,” Dreamgirls.
- “Luka Chuppi,” Rang de Basanti.
- “The Motion,” 3 Needles.
- “My Little Girl,” Flicka.
- “Never Gonna Break My Faith,” Bobby.
- “Never Let Go,” The Guardian.
- “O Kazakhstan,” Borat Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.
- “Open Your Heart,” Saving Shiloh.
- “Ordinary Miracle,” Charlotte’s Web.
- “Our Town,” Cars.
- “Patience,” Dreamgirls.
- “Philosophy,” Step Up.
- “PJ & Rooster,” Idlewild.
- “Quest for Love,” Arthur and the Invisibles.
- “Real Gone,” Cars.
- “Really Nice Day,” The Wild
- “Shine on ‘Em,” Blood Diamond
- “The Song of the Heart,” Happy Feet
- “Star Mile,” The Last Kiss
- “Still,” Over the Hedge
- “Suenos,” Hollywood Familia
- “Sweet Music,” Glory Road
- “Til the End of Time,” Little Miss Sunshine
- “Tonight,” Night at the Museum
- “Try Not to Remember,” Home of the Brave
- “Upside Down,” Curious George
- “When You Taught Me How to Dance,” Miss Potter
- “Won’t Let You Fall,” Poseidon
- “You Know My Name,” Casino Royale
Eragon. Stefen Fangmeier’s action fantasy is one of the seven films in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ list of semifinalists for the 2007 Best Visual Effects Oscar; three of them will ultimately be shortlisted in that category. In the Eragon cast: Ed Speleers, Sienna Guillory, Robert Carlyle, Garrett Hedlund, Christopher Egan, Best Actor Oscar winner Jeremy Irons (Reversal of Fortune, 1990), two-time Best Supporting Actor Oscar nominee John Malkovich (Places in the Heart, 1984; In the Line of Fire, 1993), and the voice of Best Supporting Actress Oscar winner Rachel Weisz (The Constant Gardener, 2005).
Best Visual Effects Oscar semifinalists
Below is the longish list of seven films still “in consideration” for the 2007 Best Visual Effects Academy Award. They are:
- Casino Royale.
- Eragon.
- Night at the Museum.
- Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest.
- Poseidon.
- Superman Returns.
- X-Men: The Last Stand.
Apparently, the visual effects found in Guillermo del Toro’s fantasy Pan’s Labyrinth weren’t considered special enough.
On Jan. 17, the Academy’s Visual Effects Award nominating committee will watch 15-minute excerpts from each of the seven films.
Following the screenings, members will vote to nominate three films for the 2007 Oscar.
Best Song & Best Visual Effects ‘contenders’
As an aside, four of the seven semifinalists listed above are also in the running (or rather, are eligible) for the Best Original Song Oscar: Eragon, Night at the Museum, Poseidon, and, inevitably, the James Bond flick Casino Royale.
As another aside, the 1972 Best Song Oscar winner was from the original 1972 The Poseidon Adventure: Al Kasha and Joel Hirschhorn’s “The Morning After,” sung by Carol Lynley’s character (with Renee Armand’s voice) and later turned into a Gold record by Maureen McGovern.
Best Make-Up Oscar semifinalists
More awards season news: Guillermo del Toro’s dark fantasy Pan’s Labyrinth and the latest X-Men flick, X-Men: The Last Stand, are both in the running for the 2007 Best Make-Up Academy Award. Their five competitors are the following:
Apocalypto
Click
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
The Prestige
The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause
On Saturday, Jan. 20, the Academy’s Make-Up Award Nominating Committee will view ten-minute excerpts from each of the listed films. After the screenings, members will vote to nominate three films.
Oscar 2007: Best Documentary Short semifinalists
Eight films remain in contention for the 2007 Oscars’ Best Documentary Short category. Of these, three to five will earn a nomination. Here they are, in alphabetical order:
- The Blood of Yingzhou District
- Dear Talula
- The Diary of Immaculée
- Phoenix Dance
- Recycled Life
- Rehearsing a Dream
- A Revolving Door
- Two Hands
Best Animation Oscar Contenders
Press Release: Beverly Hills, CA – With 16 animated features submitted for consideration in 2006, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences anticipates that its Animated Feature Film category, for the first time since 2002, may include a full slate of five nominees.
The 16 features expected to compete for 79th Academy Awards nominations are:
The Ant Bully
Arthur and the Invisibles
Barnyard
Cars
Curious George
Everyone’s Hero
Flushed Away
Happy Feet
Ice Age The Meltdown
Monster House
Open Season
Over the Hedge
Paprika
Renaissance
A Scanner Darkly
The Wild
Arthur and the Invisibles, Happy Feet and Paprika have not yet had their required Los Angeles releases. If any one of the group were not to meet that requirement, the field in the category would fall below 16, the number required to trigger the five-nominee slate. With 15 or fewer contenders, Academy rules allow a maximum of three nominated features.
Films submitted in the Animated Feature category also may qualify for Academy Awards in other categories, including Best Picture, provided they meet the requirements for those categories.
Nominations for the 79th Academy Awards will be announced on Tuesday, January 23, 2007, at 5:30 a.m. PST in the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater.
Academy Awards for outstanding film achievements of 2006 will be presented on Sunday, February 25, 2007, at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center, and televised live by the ABC Television Network at 5 p.m. PST, beginning with a half-hour arrival segment.
notes
Sacha Baron Cohen Borat Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan image: 20th Century Fox.
Eragon image: 20th Century Fox.
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences website.
*last modified in February 2026.